Soviet Union With Georgia on His Mind

By NANCY TRAVER MOSCOW

Shortly after noon last Thursday, crockery rattled as a quake hit Tbilisi, the capital of the Soviet Republic of Georgia. It was a minor tremor -- especially when compared with the political convulsion that shook the city four days earlier. Then, at a rally that stretched into the early-morning hours of Sunday, tens of thousands of Georgians listened to a megaphone of speakers demand greater freedom from Moscow. Many protesters carried the black-white-and-claret flag that waved during Georgia's most recent period of independence, from 1918 to 1921. Others hoisted signs that read DOWN WITH THE DECAYING SOVIET EMPIRE.

At 4 a.m., some 6,000 demonstrators remained, refusing to leave. Catholicos- Patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church Ilya II warned the crowd of an impending "horror," but he was hooted down. Suddenly the streetlights went out, and darkness descended on Rustaveli Prospekt, the city's main avenue. Waves of soldiers, supported by tanks and armored personnel carriers, swept into the crowd carrying clubs and spades. Some citizens fought back with rocks. Others bolted, trampling women and the elderly.

When the street fell silent, 16 people lay dead and nearly 250 were injured; three later died of their wounds. It was the worst day of ethnic violence in the Soviet Union since February 1988, when 32 died after gangs of Azerbaijanis hunted down Armenians in the Azerbaijan city of Sumgait. The authorities immediately imposed an 11 p.m.-to-6 a.m. curfew. Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze, a native of Georgia, canceled a trip to East and West Germany and flew to Tbilisi, where he appealed for calm. A government commission was set up to investigate the deaths, and Georgian party boss Dzhumber Patiashvili resigned along with two other members of the republic's ruling Politburo. In an emotional speech reported on Vremya, the nightly news program, Patiashvili had already admitted that "this is our mutual grief, and we are responsible."

The Soviet leadership closed Tbilisi to foreign journalists, but it could not hide from the truth: the thorny problem of nationalism had erupted in violence yet again in one of Mikhail Gorbachev's non-Russian republics. From the Baltic republics to earthquake-devastated Armenia, greater independence from Moscow has become a rallying cry. The latest troubles began last month, when a minority group known as the Abkhazians, who live in an autonomous enclave in the western part of Georgia, demanded full independence. Georgians, who account for 48% of the population in Abkhazia where Abkhazians are a mere 17%, staged counterprotests, which quickly spread to Tbilisi and mushroomed into calls for more autonomy from Moscow and even secession. As funeral processions snaked through Tbilisi's streets last week, Gorbachev said he was "deeply grieved" by the tragedy but warned that "we will not allow a blow to be dealt to the brotherhood of the U.S.S.R. or to the cause of reform."

In 1978, when Moscow attempted to replace Georgian with Russian as the republic's official language, protesters flooded the avenues of Tbilisi. But the region's party secretary defused the crisis by boldly stepping before the angry crowds and announcing that he agreed with them. His name: Eduard Shevardnadze.

Shevardnadze persuaded Moscow that its plans were foolish, but he may not be as successful in placating tempers this time. Only a public trial and punishment of the army officers responsible for the decision to clear the crowd is likely to satisfy the Georgians, and many will still press for more independence from Moscow. The Supreme Soviet last week issued a double-edged decree that is not likely to improve matters. It replaces discredited laws against dissidents but conveniently enables the state to imprison those found guilty of "kindling inter-ethnic or racial hostility." Unless ethnic passions in Tbilisi can be lulled, the Georgians may find themselves among the first to test that new law.

With reporting by Paul Hofheinz/ Moscow